Funeral company faces fines, criminal charges in Florida

Published: Saturday, May 24, 2003

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP)  The state filed criminal felony charges against the world's largest funeral industry company charging it with unearthing old bodies and tossing aside their bones to make room for more burials.

In the state's civil case against the company, Service Corporation International of Houston will have to pay up to $14 million in fines and restitution as part of a settlement agreement also announced by Florida's attorney general.

SCI and Vice President Jeffrey Frucht were charged with incompetence and misconduct in operating a cemetery. Former superintendent Robert McKay was charged twice with failing to get written permission before disinterring a body.

Investigators found some of the remains of two men, Hyman Cohen and Harold Wells, near a wooded area.

Cece Dykas, an assistant deputy attorney general, said investigators proved true "horror stories" of desecrated bodies, crushed burial vaults, and crowded graves, where couples were buried head to toe, rather than side by side.

Dykas said the acts were done "completely for the corporate bottom line."

"Unfortunately this is an industry that is surprisingly not as regulated as families would believe," Dykas said.

SCI spokesman Don Mathis said the company inherited many of the problems at the Menorah Gardens cemeteries, which SCI began running in late 1995, and that investigators should have gone after the gravediggers who were responsible, rather than wrongly blaming the corporation and Frucht.

"It was some employees doing things they shouldn't have done, things that defy human decency and common sense," Mathis said.

Mathis said Frucht "was a good employee who tried to shape up a couple of tough properties."

Frucht turned himself in at the Palm Beach County jail Thursday morning and remains there on $4,500 bond. McKay has agreed to turn himself in at his arraignment, authorities said.

Both could serve up to five years in prison if convicted.

McKay, who was fired from the company, could not be reached for comment because there was no phone listing for him in Palm Beach County.

SCI already faces a civil lawsuit filed on behalf of 1,400 families who claim the cemetery operator dug up graves and dumped the remains in bordering woods, ignoring problems with crowding for years. Another lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges that a deceased man's tongue was cut out before burial in an attempt to make his body more presentable for an open coffin viewing.

Ted Leopold, an attorney who represents 50 families in another civil case, said the criminal charges "are confirmation of everything we've been saying for months and months."

Dykas said the state's criminal and civil cases will not affect families' lawsuits. As part of the $14 million settlement agreement, $2 million will be set aside for individuals who have suffered damages. Another $4.6 million in refunds has been paid to families.

In addition, SCI agreed to follow new industry standards that Dykas said were the most comprehensive in the nation. The company must conduct a statewide review of each of its more than 50 cemeteries to make sure that bodies were buried in the proper location and that cemetery plots that are sold don't encroach on neighboring plots. A court-appointed examiner also will continue to oversee each burial at the Menorah cemeteries and ensure that all consumer complaints are resolved. Dykas said she expects the examiner to be in place for several years.

"It will be the best documented cemetery in the country," said Mathis, who applauded the new rules.

Phyllis Weiss said the new regulations came too late for her husband, who was buried at a Menorah cemetery in 1997.

"I hope the cemetery goes back to normal where you don't have to worry that they'll be dug up or dumped or have their tongue cut off," she said. "I still don't know where he is, if he's down there or not."